Page 29 of Sister of the Bride

Now I just want nachos

I took up running after my dad died.

I was eighteen, a week into my freshman year of college. It was the morning of the funeral, and I was standing in my bedroom, staring at two black dresses, trying to decide which one I never wanted to wear again. Because I knew that as soon as I followed my father’s casket down the aisle of St. Michael’s in this dress, I’d never be able to look at it again, much less wear it. I had taken charge of planning the funeral and was trying to step in to handle as much as I could at the restaurant, and still I was so full of itchy energy that if I didn’t do something I was going to wind up standing in the middle of Charles Street and screaming until my lungs fell out.

Dad’s death was something I couldn’t plan for—none of us could. His heart attack came as a total shock. One minute he was serving plates, greeting customers, and teasing me, and the next he was gone. And for someone who’d gone through life with a checklist in hand and a plan in mind, I felt especially unmoored when he died at fifty-one. Running started as an escape—literally—from the sadness of his funeral and soon became my therapy. Now if I go more than a few days without a run, even a short one, I feel on the verge of emotional liftoff.

Back home, I slip out of my jeans and into running shorts and pull my stubby ponytail through the back of a Red Sox cap. I pop in my earbuds and fire up a playlist of seventies, eighties, and nineties rock to set my pace. Once my sneakers are tied, I’m out the door.

My run always begins as a game of human Frogger as I dodge the crowds in Beacon Hill, but once I hit the Esplanade, it usually starts to open up. Which is when I can finally relax, sync my pace to the beat of the music, and just run. I focus on my breathing, on the rhythm of my feet hitting the pavement, on not overstriding and giving myself shin splits (a lesson I learned in my early days of trying to sprint down the Esplanade like a gazelle on the savannah).

I breath in.Ten million dollars.I breathe out.

That’s life-changing money. Were it not for the fact that Great-Grandpa Marino took ownership of the building nearly a hundred years ago under dubious circumstances, there’s no way we’d be living on Charles Street today. I mean, not only could we never open Marino’s now, we couldn’t even afford to continue running the restaurant if we didn’t own the building outright. It’s why I had to make so many changes after Dad died. Sure, the building is free, but things like property taxes? And maintenance on a building that’s over a hundred years old? Those are definitely not. So the menu got smaller, the hours grew fewer, and we lived to see another day.

But with ten million dollars and no restaurant to run, all our lives will be very different. Mom and Nonna can retire, obviously. Nonna can watch her medical dramas and read her cozy mysteries and make pasta only when she actually wants to eat pasta. Mom can take up painting again. She can teach if she wants, but she certainly doesn’t have to. Even Polly and I will reap the benefits. Sure, finding a place to live will be scary, but I’ll be able to afford it with the money Mom will set aside for me. And I’ll be able to take my time figuring out what I want to do after I’m no longer running Marino’s.

I try to let the idea sink in. That I won’t have to worry about the restaurant going under anymore. That I won’t have to be the keeper of the family legacy. That’ll be a relief, right? It’s been hard trying to keep it going with the weight of my dad’s—hell, with three generations of my family’s hopes and dreams on my shoulders.

As I run, I try to picture my new life. I’ll need a place to live. And a new job. I have a business degree and experience, so I’m totally employable, but what do Iwantto do? I’ve never done anything but restaurant work. The thought of running a different restaurant—someoneelse’sbaby—seems wrong, like putting on someone else’s underwear. But if I didn’t, would I miss being in a kitchen, slinging plates, greeting customers? Would I miss the regulars and the celebrations?

I blink and realize I’ve already made it down to the BU soccer fields, and I decide to turn back. I spend the return run trying to chart a course for my future, but I feel like I’m trying to sail a ship on foggy seas.

I’m almost back to the Charles Street T station when I see him.

Toby was never a runner when he lived here, so it must be something he picked up while he was in school. And watching him run—shirtless—next to the river, his tall, lean frame moving almost elegantly, I see that he’s taken to it quite well. He looks like one of those guys who used to run cross-country and is now training for the marathon. He has a long, bouncy stride. He’s wearing some kind of headband to hold back his thick curls, and sweat is glistening on his sculpted chest. A woman ahead of me passes him and then fully stops on the path to turn and stare.

Yeah, right there with ya, sister.

And then all of a sudden I’m imagining what it would be like for Toby to wrap those tanned, muscular arms around me, pull me close, his skin on mine and his lips moving down my neck andoh my god stop it. I’ve got to keep my mind from taking a swan dive directly into the gutter just because I saw Toby without a shirt on.

And Ireallyhave to stop thinking like that at this very moment, because he’s getting closer, and I can’t be caught ogling him, mouth agape. That would be hard to explain.Sorry, Toby, I accidentally had a sex thought about you the other day, and you showing up in front of me shirtless is making those thoughts multiply like horny bunnies!

I’m trying to make my eyes obey my brain and look the fuck the other way when an older man in Rollerblades and a neon-orange vest comes ripping around Toby at a speed that doesn’t seem physically possible unless he has rocket boosters strapped to his ankles. He does a little hop and turns backward, his feet swizzling in and out for a few strides before he hops back around. I’m so dazzled by his moves (which include some artful arm motions) that I don’t realize he’s about to crash directly into me until it’s nearly too late. I try to leap out of his way, which instead puts me directly in the path of a mom pushing a double jogging stroller, so I leap in the opposite direction.

A flash of dark green and the thoughtThis is going to hurtare all I get before I collide headfirst with a lamppost. My last thought before I crumple to the ground is,Polly will absolutely murder me if I’m missing my front teeth at her wedding.

I don’t know if I actually black out or if my soul just leaves my body for a moment so I can contemplate this absolute disaster, but all of a sudden I’m sitting up, Toby kneeling at my side, and when I reach up to my forehead, my Red Sox cap is missing and my hand comes away covered in red.

In blood.

And then I really do pass out.

When I open my eyes, I expect to see blue sky and trees and feel mud soaking into the butt of my running shorts. Instead I feel the rush of arctic air conditioning and see a harsh wash of neon bulbs and white-speckled ceiling tiles. And I’m not on the ground—I’m being cradled by a pair of strong arms.

“What the hell?” I mutter, but the effort required to produce words sends a spike of pain through my forehead.

“Oh, thank god,” Toby says, pausing in the hallways to study me. Because they’rehisstrong arms that are holding me up. “Pip, do you know what day it is?”

“Saturday. Do I still have my teeth?” I move my tongue over my front teeth and feel them all still firmly in place, thank god. “Where am I?”

Toby grins, then looks up, scanning the space. “Hey, Naseema, open curtain?”

A young black doctor in a hijab studies the tablet in her hand. “Three, but it’s gonna be a while. Bachelor party of fifteen just arrived with either alcohol poisoning or norovirus. It’s barfing frat boys as far as the eye can see.”

“No problem. This’ll just be a quick in and out, I think.”

She arches an eyebrow at him, maybe because he’s breaking the rules or maybe because he’s standing in the middle of the ER shirtless. Whatever the reason, I’m pretty sure I like her. “Fine. But Hollister is attending today, so keep an eye out.”

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